Corn peptides (CPs) are rich in branched‐chain amino acids such as leucine and have a variety of biological activities such as antioxidant and improved lipid distribution. In this article, we prepared CPs by enzymatic digestion of corn proteins and evaluated their anti‐fatigue activity.

We evaluated the anti‐fatigue effect of CPs through an exhaustive swimming experiment. The results showed that CPs were able to significantly reduce the rate of body weight gain and prolong the duration of exhaustive swimming. Besides, CPs reduced blood urea nitrogen (BUN) levels after exercise, while they significantly increased muscle glycogen and liver glycogen stores. They reduced muscle cell damage from exercise. In addition, CPs were effective in increasing AMPK, PGC‐1α and PI3K protein expression levels and promoting Akt phosphorylation. Correlation analysis showed that CPs increased the abundance of probiotics such as Lactobacillus and Akkermansia in the gut microflora.

CPs, which enhanced exercise performance in mice and could modulate gut microbial composition, had significant anti‐fatigue activity. © 2021 Society of Chemical Industry.